MANCHESTER United boss Sir Alex Ferguson claims he was never worried about his side's progress in the wake of last week’s shock defeat at Burnley.

United responded in the perfect manner on Saturday, blitzing Wigan with a five-goal second-half performance that shot them up the Premier League table, chasing early pace-setters Tottenham.

It puts them in good heart for a key confrontation with Arsenal on Saturday, and with Dimitar Berbatov and Michael Owen both among the goalscorers, most of the pressure that had been building up outside Old Trafford has now been relieved.

"We can’t worry about these things," said Ferguson.

"We are not going to kill ourselves because of it, but we’re going to take reminders of it, lessons and experience.

"We all know we’ve got players with great experience at our club who are used to winning trophies over the years.

"We still weren’t prepared for the kind of setback we got on Wednesday. It shouldn’t have happened, but it did."

Having dismissed Nemanja Vidic’s brush with Hugo Rodallega at the DW Stadium on Saturday, Ferguson will no doubt accept as the obvious conclusion an FA decision today not to take further action against the Serbian.

It means Vidic will be free to face the Gunners, which could be quite important given the way Arsene Wenger’s men have started the season coupled with Rio Ferdinand’s absence with a thigh injury.

Indeed, with the exception of Ferdinand, Edwin van der Sar, Rafael Da Silva and long-term absentee Owen Hargreaves, who is due to step up his rehabilitation at United’s Carrington training base next month, Ferguson is likely to be picking from strength.

The Scot must be particularly pleased with the performances of Ben Foster, who has put his disappointing showing during the Community Shield defeat to Chelsea earlier this month to one side with some eye-catching contributions.

Foster had little chance of keeping out the one goal he has conceded, Robbie Blake’s superb winner for Burnley at Turf Moor, and against both Birmingham and Wigan produced top-quality saves at crucial times.

While Ferdinand will miss an England double-header that starts with a friendly against Slovenia on September 5 and concludes with a World Cup clash with Croatia four days later, where a victory would confirm England’s place at South Africa 2010, Foster could well have a starting berth given David James could be ruled out by a knee injury suffered in Saturday’s defeat at Arsenal.